The Mind Readers (29 page)

Martin glanced at the van in horror. ‘Where did it go in, for Heaven's sake? To kill him stone-dead like that?'

‘I'm afraid that's a job for the P.M. . . .'

‘But to kill him outright! I suppose he
is
dead?'

‘Oh yes, he's dead.' Mr Campion opened the door of his own car. He felt suddenly inexpressibly weary. The lungs? The pleura? Between the ribs to the heart itself? The epigastrium? Almost any of the big veins? The list grew longer and longer as he considered it. Almost anywhere in that fine square torso the deep injection of a few centimetres of compressed air, what an amazing amount of damage it could do; what astonishingly little trace it would leave

Meanwhile, Martin had recovered from his initial bewilderment and was becoming practical.

‘I'll mark this and leave it, then,' he said. ‘I see what you mean. We shall have a bit to report to the police.' He dropped a handkerchief into the grass and set a stone on it. ‘He was so popular,' he went on, glancing towards the van. ‘I couldn't take him but a lot of people found him invaluable.'

Mr Campion said nothing. He felt that the less told about the barman the better until he could contact Dearest and Elsie. The stroke of fortune which was going to permit him to get the full story back to headquarters still amazed him, for in these matters the full facts seldom get into the records. He had no illusions whatsoever about his own good luck; it had been a very close call.

‘I'm remarkably glad you turned up,' he said frankly as he climbed into the Humber and the younger man walked over. ‘Why did you come?'

‘Sam.' Martin was excited and trying to repress it. ‘He came in and woke us. We thought he'd had a nightmare. He said you were “beefing” because you hadn't got a gun. I didn't take it too seriously but Helena did.' He hesitated.' I suppose you were thinking along those lines?'

Mr Campion stared at him.

‘I felt something of the sort very acutely . . . oh, about twenty-five minutes ago.'

‘Don't worry about the time. That whole aspect seems completely hay-wire. There's no indication of the degree of urgency either, as far as one can see at the moment. Frankly, I don't think I'd have bothered to get out and come along if it hadn't been for the other half. . . .'

‘What was that?'

‘That Edward was worth more than you. And it was a “swiz”, as he calls it, to get the wrong one.'

‘I didn't think that!'

‘Of course you didn't.' A faint grin appeared on the intelligent face. ‘That was Fred Arnold's contribution. I didn't like the guy's manner this evening and when Sam reported that item as coming from him, I thought I'd better come out and see what was going on. Sam liked him, you know. He says he saved his cockyolly bird.'

Mr Campion blinked: ‘Sam picked up a signal from Arnold as well as from me? Is that what you're saying?'

‘Well, naturally he would.' Martin was a kindly expert. ‘These flashes appear to bombard us all, all the time, or that's the theory. With the new device people appear to become aware of too many of them while certain sensitives, Sam for example, seem to be able to distinguish and isolate those which come from people they like or at least know well. But we know practically nothing at all about any laws which govern any of this yet.'

Mr Campion passed a hand over his hair.

‘Has Sam got hold of another of these devices?'

‘No. He says he sometimes gets a flash without one, especially if he's been living with an “iggy-tube” for days beforehand. That suggests a “technique of reception” to me. I don't think it's unreasonable if the devices really are only amplifiers, as we're beginning to suspect. I tell you, Campion, the whole thing is becoming a reality.'

The thin man touched his ear which was still singing from Arnold's left hand.

‘I concur,' he murmured, grinning. Martin did not notice the smile. He was thinking, his eyes screwed up against the light which was beginning to stream in golden from the east.

‘The potentialities are vast but they're not out of this world,' he said at last. ‘I mean it's only another
thing
; like learning to fly or to isolate a virus. It's a genuine breakthrough but it doesn't alter any of the essentials.'

Mr Campion sighed. ‘Quite,' he said dryly. ‘The snakes and the angels remain but it is another skin off the onion. I'll leave you here on guard and I'll reverse back to the outfit on Roker's Tail. The sooner we get all this reported the better. We're in for a very busy time my lad, one way and another.'

‘
RIGHTIE HO.
IF
you say so. Any friend of yours is a friend of mine but that's stretching it.' Mr Knapp drew Mr Campion into a corner and threw a Gorgon's scalp of curling cables out of the way to permit him to sit down on a metal bench which looked as if it might be live.

It was mid-afternoon on the Monday following the Sunday morning when Fred Arnold had died. They were in a seldom used projection room, now serving as the Chairman's private observation cabin, slung under the roof at one end of Messrs Advance Wires' main salesroom and monitoring theatre.

A cluttered expanse spread out below them and whereas they could see most of it themselves, they were almost invisible from below.

As for the rest of the building, it was sound-proofed in that oppressive way which seems to smother the very pores of the skin and, to the non-technical mind, to produce a strange sense of foreboding.

Thos was tremendously at home in the hide-out. It was also his top secret stores department and possessed an element of ‘housemaster's desk' in its suggestion of contraband.

‘You can't argue that he's not a “busy”,' he added after a pause.

Mr Campion knew that he was not unreasonable but the position was delicate. ‘Luke is top-brass when he's at home and he's all right,' he insisted. ‘He's also just outside the door, old boy. . . .'

‘O.K., O.K.' Thos was stowing various cartons into a locker which ran round the wall. ‘I'll just get these out of sight in case. Have him in but remember we're only a cog in a ruddy great machine persided over by a tyke-coon. We're nothing but pore perishers, earning our grub and not knowing quite what we're up to except that we understand we're working for the Government.'

Mr Campion smiled wryly. ‘That should cover it,' he agreed and let himself out of the small back door which gave directly on to an iron balcony and staircase leading down on to the marsh below.

The interval, since his last visit, had been filled with County Police, Special Branch and Security activity, none of it made any easier by Lord Ludor's bland determination to keep tabs on every part of the enquiry.

As an object-lesson in getting what one wants by merely stamping towards it through the undergrowth, his had been an impressive performance, and by the time Luke had arrived about four in the afternoon on Sunday the military ban on leaving the island was still in force.

However, the Superintendent had had wartime service with the Military Police which had left him with the two essentials, know-how and friends, and finally, as the result of his efforts, Mr Campion had found himself driven past the post on the Strada by Redcaps late on Sunday. He had been rushed through the town and delivered on the roadside, much to his astonishment, to Elsie himself, who had taken the unprecedented step of driving out from London to hear the story at first hand.

As they had motored round the lanes together Mr Campion made his report and thus another patch of fungus in the oaken timbers of the old British warship was successfully sealed off for treatment.

The Director had appeared very happy but he had been able to offer very little comfort concerning Edward. There was still no sign of the child and both Amanda and the Canon were extraordinarily silent and withdrawn. The Rectory, L.C. Corkran said, was being watched by at least three different interests, one of them Security itself, who was certain that no messages were passing. His personal opinion was that the boy must be already hidden in the house but he had to admit that Lord Ludor, who had his own methods of investigation, was convinced that Edward was still away.

No attempt could be made to search the old house because no complaint had been lodged. Indeed, what with red tape and the perverse circumstances, a complete impasse appeared to have been reached.

Late on Sunday night Mr Campion had been driven back to the island and today Luke had come over from local police headquarters and had arrived at the Ferrises' hut demanding to see Advance Wires from the inside.

‘It's such a damn silly name,' he said, as he and Campion drove across the sea wall track together. ‘What does it mean?'

‘They're so advanced there aren't any.' Mr Campion waved a hand in airy explanation. ‘That's the Thos pattern of thought. He's very modern, always was. It's something to do with this half-century's great discovery: if you run past yourself there isn't anything there.'

Luke laughed. ‘You'll do,' he said, but he looked a little uncomfortable and after a while observed cautiously, ‘I suppose you're talking about the moon?'

Mr Campion did not hear him for they had already arrived.

Now that his preliminary interview with Chairman Knapp was over he looked down the iron staircase at the Superintendent whom he had left stamping about in the grass.

‘It's all right,' he said. ‘I've vouched for you. Come on up.'

‘I heard what you said,' Thos grumbled as they crowded into the tiny space and Mr Campion made the introduction. ‘It wasn't very clever, Bert, not now. When we was young we could afford our sentimental beliefs in the brotherhood of man, uniform or not, but now it's
“of course
we're very happy to see any gentleman from the police”. They don't have to be vouched for. We've got nothing to hide.'

‘There's no need to be touchy, Mr Knapp,' Luke was at his heartiest.

‘Well then, why bring it up?' The deplorable nose was twitching. ‘You sit here, Super. Then you'll have a nice clear view and won't be so ruddy noticeable.'

The scene below had much of the bewildering inconsequence of a television studio coupled with the gift section of a department store. Since much of the firm's business lay with clients who required hidden microphones in other people's premises, there was a fine florid collection of gifts; chandeliers, ashtrays on stalks, baroque table-lamps, ormulu clocks and bedside cabinets, as well as toys in quantity and what are known darkly in the trade as “small antiques”. The fact that they all contained hidden ears comforted Mr Campion since he felt it provided a sane if not very pleasant reason for their existence at all, and he looked at the scene below with growing interest.

An oasis in the midst of the trailing wires, small screens and loudspeakers consisted of a carpet on which there was an arrangement of upholstered seats. Each of these could be combined with one or all of the others to make something else. They were being arranged now, by Feeoh and a long thin girl, for some purpose which looked as if it might be an animal turn and was in fact the imminent arrival of Lord Ludor himself and party, or so Thos said.

‘That's why I'm a bit edgy,' he confided with engaging frankness. ‘We've been bugging your London hideout by the way, Bert. We had to get our Slough staff out. His Lordship wants to hear the tape if there's time. We've told him there's nothing going on there.'

‘The Rectory?' said Luke, a muscle on his dark face twitching.

‘That's right. Got the order early yesterday. The old man—his Lordship—is looking for a child. You know that, do you?'

‘That's the youngster we all hope to locate over here as he contacts a certain apartment in Paris.' Luke was attempting to combine Police omniscience with a genuine if over-played effort to be pleasant. ‘Yes, thank you Mr Knapp. I think you'll find we're fully in the picture.'

‘Do you? Well then, I can't help you, can I?' The pink rat's nose was quivering and Mr Campion intervened at once.

‘And how are they all at home?' he enquired fatuously.

‘Ruddy quiet.' Thos shot a beady glance at him from under sparse white lashes. ‘I never listened in to such a family. They've all got a fit of the sulks or sore throats. We can't get anything out of them except the Third Programme. Either that or they're calling the dog.'

As both heads turned sharply towards him he shuffled.

‘Well then, pussycat,' he said. ‘Name of Cavey. Cavey, Cavey all the time from her ladyship; she doesn't seem to say anything else.'

Luke forgot twenty years of discipline and began to laugh aloud, turned it into a cough without success, and coloured.

‘So it's a parrot, is it?' said Thos, irritably. ‘Nice to meet a busy who can still do that, mister. Don't mind me. Let it fly or you'll do yourself an injury. Look Bert, I'm going down now to see what's laid on for the Lord Boss. See this?' He indicated a panel of switches on the wall. ‘I'm going to leave it that you can hear what's going on down there but you can't be heard yourselves. Touch this, however, and WOT OH FRIDAY! you've joined the party, see?'

It was quite obvious what he meant from the effect of the sudden bellow upon the furniture-movers below and Mr Campion nodded intelligently as he altered the switch once more and the sounds from the theatre faded slowly up until their dead tones were just comfortably audible.

‘. . . only some insanitary, archaic joke,' Feeoh was saying to the long thin girl. ‘A little to the left, dear. Heave. Thank you.'

As the door to the staircase closed behind their host, Luke's teeth flashed in the gloom. ‘You certainly do find them . . .' he was beginning when the thin man raised a warning finger and went round the room looking for something. He found what he wanted in a pewter tankard of old brier pipes and fished it out and disconnected it.